Modern advances in technology have led to an explosion in the amount of information that is communicated on a daily basis in work, school, and even leisure. The need to communicate effectively and clearly has never been greater than in our modern information age. For a person with any disability that prevents normal means of communication, accessibility of information can prove to be a formidable barrier. Products that can help a wide variety of people with disabilities to better communicate are not only a much-needed tool, but also legislatively mandated through a variety of recent laws, such as the Americans with Disabilities Act, Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and Rehabilitation Act. Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act states that no individual with a disability can be denied access to any program or activity that receives federal funds due to a disability. Section 508 requires that when Federal agencies develop, procure, maintain, or use electronic and information technology, employees with disabilities have access to and use of information and data that is comparable to the access and use by employees who are not individuals with disabilities. Section 508 also requires that individuals with disabilities, who are members of the public seeking information or services from a Federal agency, have access to and use of information and data that is comparable to that provided to the public who are not individuals with disabilities.
People with a wide range of disabilities, such as deaf and hard of hearing, blind and low vision, learning disabled and mobility impaired are limited in their participation with electronic equipment, for example, computers and cellular phones, and real-time events such as live lectures, movies, meetings and classroom settings.
Closed captioned text for hearing impaired people provide speech translations in real time, but this is not universally available. For example, although closed captioned text is available for some television presentations, not all television networks provide it. Furthermore, closed captioned text is not available for entertainment venues such as motion picture theatres or live plays.
Deaf, hearing impaired and speech impaired individuals primarily communicate with others via sign language or devices such as Telecommunication Device for the Deaf (“TDD”), which is primarily a teletypewriter (“TTY”). Sign language employs hand gestures, body gestures and face expressions to convey language. There are several types of sign language in use today, including Signed English, Pidgin English, and American Sign Language (ASL—the most popular and expressive language). In a case of communication between hearing impaired persons being apart from each other, videophone devices transmit sign language gestures in real-time. But these devices are expensive and not all hearing impaired persons own a videophone device.
The number of people who can be called using a TTY/TDD device is limited because TTY/TDD users can only have conversations with others who have a TTY/TDD device, have access to a TTY/TDD device, and know how to use a TTY/TDD device. Most TTY/TDD devices currently available in the marketplace are land based and the user must have access to a standard telephone line to be able to communicate.
The hearing impaired also use TTY-to-speech relay services to communicate with a hearing person. These services use a person to read TTY text from the hearing impaired person and vocalize the message to the hearing person. In response the person listens to the message from the hearing person and types the TTY text to the hearing impaired person. Relay services are not practical because they require a third party for each and every telephone conversation. This eliminates privacy in personal or financial situations. Moreover, relay readers may make mistakes in vocalizing or typing the conversation.
The Braille format was devised to enable the blind or visually impaired to read alphanumeric characters using their sense of touch. Braille is represented as “cells” of dots raised above the surface of the reading material. Each Braille cell consists of eight dots, arranged in two columns of four dots each. Each character is identified by the specific set of dots that are raised in the cell. Braille writing itself can be formed on different types of media. The most prevalent form of Braille is printed material. Braille is printed using special printers that emboss the raised dots on sheets of paper or plastic. Furthermore, the additional processing required to produce a Braille publication or reproduce a regular publication in Braille format, as well as the extra size of the materials, increase the expense of producing these publications. This severely limits the scope of material available in Braille.
Clearly, it would be desirable to develop improved methods and systems that allow the communication capabilities of people with disabilities to be extended in the digital technology world. Over the past several years, it has become imperative for companies to develop systems, processes, and apparatus that enable people with disabilities to communicate more efficiently and effectively. The DEAF-core technology is software, based on existing technologies and a specialized version of XML termed “gh XML”, that converts a variety of inputs into a variety of desired outputs for improved communication for people with disabilities.